


blue ink stains.

by onlyeli



Series: danganronpa studies. [4]
Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Dangan Ronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc
Genre: Backstory, Character Study, Other, but ig you could read it that way, sibling relationships, this isnt supposed to be naegami
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2020-06-26 14:31:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19770196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onlyeli/pseuds/onlyeli
Summary: she may have been forgotten, but the subconscious clings to the funniest little things.or: byakuya does laundry.





	blue ink stains.

**Author's Note:**

> this is probably hard to follow unless you've read dr: togami so spoilers for that as i give you the rundown:  
> shinobu is byakuya's sister, one of the fourteen togami siblings that lost the heir competition. however, she's kept around as the super hight school level secretary, tasked to write byakuya's memoir under the pseudonym blue ink. at the end of dr: togami, she's murdered and her memory is wiped from the minds of everyone that knew her. the only remnant of her existence is her favoured fountain pen, which byakuya keeps in his breast pocket.

Byakuya is fifteen and she is, well, not. Shinobu (Togami) is the cusp of seventeen, a blonde beauty born to a house rather than a family. She stands elbow-deep in suds and water, maids waved away with an apologetic smile and not much else. Despite the nature of their mansion, the too-full overflow of secretaries and housekeepers and one father one heir one sister-exile, the dishes never take up too much of her time. The nature of keeping her around hinges on her completion of Byakuya-sama’s memoir, and it will be done. Eventually. For now, she cleans, hair pulled up around through, held back from her face with her fountain pen.

‘We have people we pay to do that,’ her little brother scoffs from behind her, sparing no seconds to hover. Straight through the doorway comes the Togami corporation’s greatest weapon, his suit creased at the elbows. Piano practice lingers on him like an old heat, a stain he’d overdressed. She smiles. So many secrets he supposes he keeps. 

‘I know,’ she says, turning her attention to him for only a moment, ‘but I like to do it. You’ll see, when you tire of your stockbroking.’ 

He, who can’t imagine the dirt under his nails, rolls his eyes. ‘Somehow, I doubt that. I wanted to let you know that Father says you have to write another chapter of my book by this Monday.’

The siblings share a shrewd half-glance. Byakuya may have won over her, used her cupped hands as a leg-up to cling to the throne’s backrest, but they are still blood. Togami instinct runs through she and him both. They do not have to speak to understand each other, to an extent that they neither understand. Byakuya knows when she thinks of him, can meet her eyes across a room filled to the foundations with people he must be civil with, and she can scan his mind for thoughts that paint her smirking. The Togamis are a family that know, and no one knows better than Byakuya and his youngest older sister. 

‘Pass me the towel, Byakuya-kun,’ Shinobu asks, leaning backward anyway, as if she can make his journey shorter. His narrowed eyes are all she needs to start her giggling. The towel hits her square in the jaw, falls into the half-dissolved soap suds and sets her squealing. ‘Look what you did!’ Sopping cloth plucked from draining sink is waved in his direction accusingly, spraying the spotless floor with watermarks, enough to turn a hair on the head of every maid, every butler. 

His slim hand presses against his chest. ‘How dare you blame the heir for your own misfortune. That’s incredibly unbecoming, Shinobu.’ 

Byakuya escapes through the door long before her wet-wringed fingers flick droplets his way. His blond head vanishes around the corner, door shutting soft, leaving her in a kitchen that echoes her humming. This moment she neglects to pen down. Some things she wants to remember on her own. 

\--

Byakuya is nineteen, so he thinks, and sick to his back teeth of stiff collars and crumpled sleeves. Having banished the others to their search, the hapless sniffing for a solution they seem so fond of, he closes himself in the laundry room and discards his blazer. Out of the top pocket falls a fountain pen that has long since gone inkless. He scribes his own story with ballpoints now, ones he finds on his colleague's desks and library drawers when no one is bothering. Only Fukawa knows this, of course, her slavering stalking giving her privy to his quietest moments. He is used to spectators, which made ignoring her all the easier, and now she is gone. Even so, the fountain pen remains on his person. He picks it up as soon as it rolls through his field of vision. 

Nothing about it screams importance. In fact, the metal is scratched something awful in places, bent and malwarped towards the lid. An appliance that can no longer carry out its function should be thrown out, but he woke at a desk with this in his clenched fist, and so it stays in his pocket. Byakuya returns it homeward as he hangs up his jacket, doesn’t think about the verb to write as he rolls up his sleeves to the unmarked elbows. 

Hampers filled to the brim with worn clothes surround him, untouched and unassuming. His lip curls at the idea of touching their garments, having to break a sweat for people with half of that which makes him ultimate. Even so, when he empties his basket into a machine and his tension sits amongst the swish of heated water, he finds the notion becomes less and less disgusting. 

If he does it quickly and quietly, they shouldn’t notice. Yukisome makes it easy, allows him to feign ignorance and innocence. He begins with Makoto’s pile.

‘Hey, you know, I think Chisa does all of that for us,’ comes his voice, tender with amusement and intrigue. How Byakuya thought he could get away with anything when the Ultimate Luck dogs him determined is beyond him.

‘I know,’ the heir sniffs, fingers resting on frames of glasses that glint, ‘but I’ve found that each time I get my shirts back, they’re creased at the elbows. Do you want something, Naegi? I don’t take kindly to being intruded on.’ 

Makoto only smiles, hovering a two-step, in the room one moment and out of it the next. ‘Just checking up on you.’ 

‘How noble,’ Byakuya says, sneers, really, but it’s quiet in its condescending. ‘If you’re going to stick around and pollute the air, feel free to fetch me the fabric softener. It’s on your left.’ 

Naegi, dutiful, fetches his request, sits still long enough to learn that Byakuya seems to know what he’s doing. ‘You’re good at this.’

‘I’m good at most things,’ Byakuya says, repressing a scoff. ‘Don’t talk. It grates on me.’

They fall silent. Neither need words -- Byakuya knows when people think of him, feels their consideration frost over his forearms, and Makoto loses himself in his internal narration soon enough. It’s comfortable in the quiet, the echoing thrum of machines set to cleanse.

**Author's Note:**

> when oh when will i write a fic that contains a character someone cares about??? stay tuned  
> as with all my other studies if anything is wrong it's because i wanted it to be - i'm picky with dr canon and just choose to keep what i like best.  
> anyways comments/kudos are always appreciated!! thank you for reading!!  
> 'pennyworth made green beans'  
> '...okay?'


End file.
